


Wash Clean Your Way

by spiney



Category: Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
Genre: Camaraderie, F/M, One Night Stands, Only One Bed, Post-In My Time of Need, Sexual Content, Short One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-31
Updated: 2019-07-31
Packaged: 2020-07-28 01:15:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,392
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20055643
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spiney/pseuds/spiney
Summary: Rath suspects there is more reward to be had after turning Iman over to the Alik'r mercenaries.





	Wash Clean Your Way

_ ...But even in the towered town, _

_ Sandals tread tracks in Alik'r sand. _

_ For all those born of Redguard blood _

_ Bring the wastes with them where e'er they go.… _

—Weltan of Sentinel, “On the Immortality of Dust”

Rath leaned against the stone wall outside Whiterun’s stables and watched as a pair of Alik’r mercenaries heaved Saadia’s—or Iman’s, or whoever’s—rigid form onto the back of a wagon. The sun had set hours ago, and they worked by the light of torches and the pale glow of the late summer moons. Kematu stood beside her, arms crossed, watching his men with the calm, careful eye of a seasoned leader. When they had secured their human cargo with quick, precise knotwork, Kematu nodded, relaxed his shoulders, and turned to Rath with parting words on his brow.

Rath spoke first. “It’s late.”

Tilting his head and flashing a crooked smile, Kematu squinted, studying her. “I’m aware.”

“Your people going back to the cave?”

He nodded. “We’ll begin the journey back to Hammerfell come morning.”

Rath gestured toward the carriage. “Let them go. You should stay. Come over to Honningbrew, have a drink.”

It took a little convincing to get the solemn man to follow her to the meadery, but the promise of an evening free of responsibility was clearly appealing. He was obviously tired, and the relief of securing his fugitive showed in the new looseness in his neck and shoulders, the sigh that left him with his first swallow of mead.

Rath sipped lightly, rested an elbow on the back of her chair, leaned back as she watched him. “You’ve been on the road a while, then.”

He laughed, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Too long. We’d been tracking Iman for years. We almost had her… gods, a dozen times. I’m still… I don’t think I’ll believe it until we hand her over.”

“Must be quite a prize,” Rath said, and Kematu straightened. He pushed his drink just a little farther away as he settled his elbows on the table.

“What’s your angle, my friend?” His tone was cool and edged, at once amicable and stony.

Rath smiled and matched his posture, leaning forward on her elbows, voice low and calculating. “It’s been you and six other mercs tracking this single bounty for  _ years _ . That’s not a cheap undertaking. Years of other, easier jobs that you spent following one woman. You must be expecting quite a return on your investment.” Kematu narrowed his eyes, leaned back in his chair, crossed his arms. Rath continued. “And yet,” she said, sliding a small coinpurse onto the table, “all you could spare for the helping hand who, through no small effort, brought an end to your journey,” she tapped the side of the purse, its contents jangling softly, “was this little pouch of gold. A body might feel shortchanged, considering the circumstances.” She shrugged, leaned back, took a long pull from her tankard.

Kematu’s laugh was barking, a robust, haughty sound. His brow was arched and he smiled broadly as he shook his head. “Brass balls, hm. But we haven’t been paid yet; you’re free to search me—you’ll find I’ve no more coin to offer, only enough for my own way. Even if you robbed me, you wouldn’t be leaving here much wealthier than you came.” His gaze turned slightly sinister, trailing over her shoulders and arms, taking measure of her. “I don’t advise that you attempt to rob me,” he said, leaning close again, mischievous smile glinting in the warm lamplight. One hand moved to his hip, rested briefly on the pommel of his sword, causing the blade to rise and fall gently in Rath’s periphery.

Rath pressed her lips tight, felt the spread of a feline smile as she dropped her eyes to the weapon. “I’m trembling,” she said, flat and thick with irony.

She’d been a sellsword long enough; she believed he hadn’t been paid. The real profit, she knew, could be had in tracking Kematu’s band, following them back to Hammerfell to poach the bounty. It would be a huge risk, both physically and financially—it would also be the first time she’d set foot in her home country in… She pursed her lips, exhaled gently through her nose. The whole ordeal hardly seemed worth the trouble. She’d done her due diligence trying to eke out a few more septims, and in any case she would still walk away with payment far more generous than the work she’d put in was worth. And so she wouldn’t push it. At least, not much.

There were other rewards she might pursue.

Business shelved for the night, Rath and Kematu talked easily, finished their drinks quickly, and when Rath approached the bar she booked the last room they had available. They took the second round more slowly, recounted travels and fights and memories of the desert, and Rath found herself soothed by the warm, clear sound of his voice, softened by mead and the dim light and the want that was quietly growing in her chest. She indicated that she would stay at the meadery, and that Kematu was free to join her if he’d rather not trek westward in the middle of the night. He accepted the offer with almost demure politeness, though his eyes fixed on hers with brash anticipation.

“One bed?” Kematu closed the door gently as they walked into the small, low-lit room. “Feeling awfully confident.”

Rath smirked, crossing the creaking floorboards and beginning to unlace her bracers. “Nothing keeping me here,” she said, “I’d do just as well sacked out on the carriage back to Riften. Just say the word.”

Kematu licked his lips, watched her movements closely as she removed her armor. “Nothing keeping you here?” he said, stepping closer, slow and deliberate. “If I didn’t know you were lying I expect I’d feel insulted.”

“Accusing a woman of being a liar, a surefire way to get her into your bed.” Rath placed her pauldron onto the dresser beside her bracers and began to unbuckle the straps along her ribcage.

“It’s not my bed,” Kematu said, and Rath laughed despite herself. She closed the distance between them, placed her hands on his waist, warm and solid and yes, this was a good idea, best idea she’d had in a long time.

“I’d like to fuck you,” she said, hands moving lower over the heavy cotton of his trousers, thumbs pressing over the jut of his hipbones.

Kematu leaned into her palms, slipped his hands up her sides beneath her loosened armor. “I would be happy to oblige,” he said, then dipped his head and kissed her.

Rath wasn’t prepared, not for any of it. Not for the thick softness of his lips, not for the sun-rough texture of his skin, and not at all for the spicy herbal scent clinging to his clothes, remnants of soaps and powders she hadn’t smelled in years. She fell into the kiss, snaking her arms around Kematu’s back, pulling their bodies flush, sucking and biting at his lips with enthusiasm.

For all the show they’d each made of their toughness, the cold and cutting demeanor they clearly shared, the sex was strangely tender. They were both alone, far from home, tasked with heavy burdens—bared to each other, bodies strong and scarred and proud, they seemed to reach an understanding, and so they touched with careful, searching hands, tasted with curious tongues, breathed each other in with the wild relief of finding something lost.

She laughed as she came, laughed at the absurdity of things, let herself be taken by the brief delusion that nothing mattered, that her obligations and failures were nothing at all, that she could be suspended here, pulsing around a momentary lover, and it would somehow be enough.

When the snap of Kematu’s hips grew frantic and his breath caught on a groan he pulled himself from her, rolled to his side, worked his cock furiously until his whole body tensed and arched in long, beautiful lines curving under Rath’s gaze as he spilled onto the sheets.

They touched and kissed and slept, and in the morning, waking before the sun, Rath robbed him. She left enough gold behind for breakfast and a hired wagon, quietly collected her armor, and headed east into the dawn.

**Author's Note:**

> Rath originally comes from [Reach Heaven by Violence](https://archiveofourown.org/works/941143/chapters/1835114) by [mongoose_bite](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mongoose_bite/pseuds/mongoose_bite).  
Thanks to [raunchyandpaunchy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/raunchyandpaunchy/pseuds/raunchyandpaunchy) and [Thanatopsiturvy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thanatopsiturvy/pseuds/Thanatopsiturvy%22) for being my beta eyeballs, and to [FourCatProductions](https://archiveofourown.org/users/FourCatProductions) for helping land on a title! [Title is from an ESO map](https://en.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Inscription_found_in_ruins_of_an_ancient_shelter_for_travelers).


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